It’s the 31st of October and my interior band leader is smiling. She’s standing there in her black and white looking like part of the Lesbian Mafia, baton in hand, just smiling that little half-smile that fairly screams “I’m good. I know I’m good. You know I’m good. So why are we still talking about this?” You see, National Novel Writing Month starts tomorrow and I fully intend on writing another book this year.
OK, so the first book I wrote didn’t actually get “finished” until January 2005, and truthfully I don’t consider it finished because I still have some character motivations to work out and I haven’t gotten the courage to shop it around yet.
My second book I wrote in a stupor in November 2005. It was a refuge from the horror of the event horizon I could see coming and hoped against all hope was a mirage. I got to immerse myself in a world that while not completely happy didn’t on the surface have much to do with what was going on in “the real world.”
In 2006 I was just too wiped out both creatively and physically to consider trying a book. 2006 was NaBloPoMo year and it probably saved my creative life. NaBloPoMo got me writing again when I couldn’t envision myself ever again putting pen to paper or fingers to keys for anything but work. And while all my entries aren’t great art, at least I didn’t descend into the cheating that is just posting random quotes (and yes, it is cheating; while it fills the blog it’s not original writing unless you expand upon or analyze said quote).
But this year even as part of me wants to run around like a naked Junior on crystal meth at the SATs, the band leader in me stands quiet and calm. Yes, I’ve got three interweaving plot lines and some gaping holes in my outline of one of them (just how does that conspiracy of mages figure in to what’s happening now with the evil wizard’s blood magic?), I’ve lost my baby name book and still can’t find something portentious to name the kid I need to name (sorry, Jim, dudette is out), and I’ve got a character banging on the door shouting to be let in (who is Ryan, what is her destiny, and why is she always wearing that ratty, navy blue hoodie?) but the band leader knows that starting tomorrow all this swirling energy will coalesce into something More. In his kick-off pep talk e-mail NaNoWriMo founder Chris Baty writes
The secret of NaNoWriMo which is this: There is a door in your brain. The door has been there your whole life. You may not have noticed it before because it blends in with everything else in your brain. Weird art. Mismatched furniture. Squishy gray bits clinging to everything.
So what does this door have to do with your novel?
Your job this month is not so much writing a book (which is intimidating) as it is finding that door (which is easy).
It’s easy because you’ll have guides in November who will take you right to it.
These guides are also known as your characters. They’re kind of an abstract notion now, but you’ll meet them in all their glory in Week One of NaNoWriMo. They’ll be a strange lot. Insecure warlocks. Stamp-collecting squirrels. Teenage detectives.
Whoever shows up, go with them. And go quickly. You may have a general sense of where you’re going together; you may not. It doesn’t matter. Just write your allotment of 1667 words (or more) on November 1. Don’t edit any of it. Editing is for December. Then come back and write another 1667 words the next day. And the next. And the next.
By Week Two, you’ll be at the door. A few words later, you’ll be through it. You’ll know you’re there because the writing will feel different. Less like work, and more like watching a gloriously imperfect movie with cringe-worthy dialogue, heaps of confusing tangents, and moments of brilliance so delightful that you’ll want to scream.
Once you’ve stepped through that door into the vast reaches of your imagination, you’ll be able to return there as often as you like. It’s an enchanted, intoxicating place, and there are other great things besides novels in there.
Regardless of the timing, my marching band and I plan on heading for that door tomorrow.